


Library

by AnselaJonla



Series: Prompt fills [60]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Gen, Prompt Fic, Prompt Fill, Reddit Prompt, r/writingprompts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-12
Updated: 2020-12-12
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:20:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28019142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnselaJonla/pseuds/AnselaJonla
Summary: A fic written for a prompt on the r/WritingPrompts subreddit:[WP] As a scribe, you've been asked by many people to help them sort and organize their collections of books. However, you've never received a request from a dragon before.
Series: Prompt fills [60]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1097823
Kudos: 2





	Library

"You want me to do _what_?" I blurt out, forgetting all rules of politeness. I cringe, waiting for the mighty beast to strike me down. One does not address a dragon without the honorifics their great kind deserves.

"You heard me, scribe," the dragon rumbles again. "I, Khilihsa, demand your assistance with organising my library.

I tremble where the dragon has dropped me, still encircled by its great claws. The very same claws that snatched me from the road and dragged me into the sky for the most terrifying half day of my life. And the most fascinating. I _must_ find parchment, quill, and ink with which to draw the land as I viewed it, before it fades from my mind.

"I can provide such, if you agree to my demands," the dragon chuckles. I hadn't even realised that I had spoken aloud. "I might even be amenable to refreshing your memory from a more comfortable perch."

Such an offer. No scribe or cartographer has ever produced such a wonderful map of the kingdoms. I would be famous across the lands.

But still, who has ever heard of a dragon with a _library_? How does such a magnificent beast manage to read the books within?

"I am pleased to hear that I am magnificent in your eyes. Among my own kind I am merely average. And yes, I do have some mild telepathic ability. You humans are so _loud_ in your thoughts, it is hard to avoid hearing them." Khilihsa unlaces her claws from around me, and starts to pad on all four paws towards the back of her cave, wings tucked tight against its body. I follow, not having anywhere else to go. There is nothing but a sheer drop outside, I would die even if I wasn't pursued.

"To answer your question, I read in much the same way as you. I turn the pages with the tip of a claw, and I read the words on them. Us dragons _do_ have great eyesight, you know."

A massive jade-scaled head pushes open a massive wooden door furnished with metal bands and a handle that looks almost custom-designed to be opened by a dragon's mouth. My jaw drops as I view the rooms within.

More doors ring a great central area, all open to reveal the rooms beyond. The door directly opposite leads to what is clearly Khilihsa's sleeping area. To its left are a treasure room, gold and jewels glinting in piles, and a tantalisingly large library. The doors to the right lead to a massive bathing area, and to a room I cannot see through a more human-sized door. In the middle of the room are giant piles of furs and seating bags around a firepit.

It looks nothing at all like the illustrations of dragon homes, with a great beast laying on a bed of gold and jewellery. Khilihsa snorts at my thoughts.

"I find those sketches amusing. Few of dragonkind still reside in such primitive conditions." She pads over to nestle down on the bed of furs. "Your accommodation is through the smaller door. You will find furnishings and fittings suitable for your form in there. I even got a mage to enchant a cupboard with a spell of cooling to preserve food. I will depart for human food later, once I have explained what I wish from you."

I nestle down on a smaller pile of furs and seating cushions across the fire pit from my host, and she begins to speak.

She is, like most of her kind, a hoarder. Her particular passion is for books, of any kind. Her library has grown in leaps and bounds, but she has a bad habit of simply shoving her newest acquisitions onto the first bit of empty shelf she sees, and so it's in a frightful state. She has heard that scribes like me have a system for sorting books so that they are easy to find, and she wants me to apply such skills to her own collection.

When she wings off, without even waiting for my agreement, I walk into the library. It is the largest I have ever set eyes on. Even the great library of the holy citadel pales in comparison to this bounty. Even allowing for room for Khilihsa to walk between the shelves, there are more books here than I have ever seen in one place _ever_. To sort this would not be the work of mere days or weeks, but instead months or maybe even _years_. I browse through the closest titles out of curiosity, and am astounded. There are books from every language I know, and many more I don't. I am not sure how I would even begin to sort the latter.

I pull those out and carry them to an empty section of shelving at the far wall. It takes me twenty minutes just to cross the library from near the door, it is so immense. I hunt for more of the books I can't read, some written in scripts that don't even resemble that I am accustomed to, and move them too. By the time that Khilihsa returns, I have filled almost ten spans of shelves with these books, to the highest I can reach without climbing up.

I don't even realise she has returned until I hear her deep chuckle from behind me. "I will bring you a means to reach higher, and something in which to carry more tomes at a time. For now you should rest. It is fully dark outside, and you must be starving."

I had not noticed my hunger in my focused excitement, but now that it was mentioned my stomach gave a loud complaint. A whole cow was resting on a grill over the now-lit firepit, its delicious aroma making my mouth water now I noticed it. A pile of food rests by the entrance to my accommodation, for me to move into the cupboards.

"You have accepted my offer than, human?"

"I am honoured that you chose _me_ for it. Every scribe I know would kill for this opportunity. This is the work of many months to complete.

Khilihsa has a satisfied twinkle in her eye, and she huffs as she tears the roasting cow into pieces without any apparent effort. "I had suspected that. You will be well provided for while you complete this task, just ask for whatever you desire and I will fetch it." Her tail flicks round to wrap around her hind legs. "And if you desire, I can teach you the languages in those books you can't read."

Well, what scribe could refuse _that_ offer?

* * *

The disappearance of Scribe Rishard as he travelled between manor and castle with the tax records of Dacordia mystified the king's court once it became known. The horse he'd been loaned was found at the side of the road, placidly eating the grass there with its laden panniers still strapped to its back. No wounds were evident on the beast, nor were there any signs of struggle near where it was found. As the records Rishard had been sent to collect were all present, Rishard's disappearance was put down to an act of the gods.

The dragon that was spotted overflying the kingdoms sometimes was of more of a concern to most of the royal advisors anyway. Attacks by the great beasts were rare, but were an ever present point of concern to those looking to justify a greater military presence within the kingdoms.

Rumours sometimes claimed that a person could be spotted on the back of the dragon, but these were dismissed as the imaginings of madmen.

One day, almost five years to the day of Rishard's disappearance, an emerald-scaled dragon was spotted over the holy citadel. The island's guards rushed out with crossbows, aimed at the sky in hopes that the empty threat (for mere bolts would not pierce the scales of any but the youngest dragon) would drive the beast away from the temples of the gods. It was not, and the dragon still approached, but instead of swooping over and releasing a gout of flame that would melt even the stone-built temples, it angled itself to land in the central square of the citadel instead.

On its back sat a man, dressed in clothes that were fine but not excessively so. They were most definitely not the simple garb of the lowly scribe that had gone missing from Dacordia's roads so mysteriously. Across his back was slung a bag, the ends of rolled up scrolls poking from the top of it.

Rishard was rushed into the great library among great fuss, his return aback a dragon deemed a miracle (although the priests, quite naturally, could not agree quite which god to attribute it to). Demands for an explanation for his absence came from every side, and he was pulled in multiple directions as the chief scribes all demanded to be given one first.

Khilihsa seemed not to notice the guards ringed around her as she closed her eyes and tucked her head under a wing. The light weapons they were permitted by treaty were not enough to threaten one as old as her. She had no reason to leave just yet. She had given her word that she wouldn't.

She stirred once more when she heard the commotion spill outside once more. A cry of 'seize him' echoed through the streets, and she lumbered back to her feet. The guards surrounding her turned towards the noise, and some moved to take hold of the figure running towards her, the one pursued by what looked like half the citadel's population.

A bellow made them pause, long enough for the man to get past them, now unburdened of his bag of maps of all the known lands, drawn from the view of one seated aback a dragon. He leaps to her back in a practiced motion, and they take to the sky.

Dragons are hoarders, and Khilihsa is no exception. And after five years, Rishard is most definitely a part of her hoard.


End file.
